The definition of music is manifold. In one instance, music may be defined as a compilation of concordant sounds that may be arranged in such a manner as to produce a harmonic melody to which it is pleasant to listen. Particularly, the early Pythagoreans discovered that a stringed instrument could be constructed, whereby if the strings were plucked within a given arrangement a consonant harmony would be produced, where as if they were plucked in random order, disharmony or a discordant sound would be produced. More particularly, Pythagoras discovered that if the strings of an instrument were of like composition, size, weight, and length; and if one plucked a first string, a first sound wave, having a vibration of a given frequency would be produced. Further, if the length of a second such string is halved and then plucked again, a harmony between the notes sounded by the vibration of the two strings being plucked would be produced, which harmony is generated by the frequency of the two vibrations being proportional. Through experimentation between the ratios of the number of strings on the instrument, their weights, and their lengths at the time of playing, the Pythagorean's found a mathematical relationship between string weight, length, and concordance, called the harmonic ratio, and thereby discovered the intervals of the octaves.
Specifically, an octave is a repeating scale of eight whole notes having an interval such that the note with the highest pitch in the octave of the scale has a sound wave frequency of vibration that is twice that of the note with the lowest pitch in the scale. Accordingly, music is made up of notes. Notes are sounds of a given pitch that form the octave such that when played in succession produce a concordant or harmonic scale. Hence, the pitch of a note demarcates how high or how low the note sounds, and is typically measured by the frequency of the vibrations caused by the sound waves emitted, e.g., measured in Hertz. For instance, a note that is vibrating at 256 Hz will be caused by sound waves that vibrate at 256 times a second, which for the piano will be the Middle C note.
There are seven different whole notes to a scale, going from the note with the lowest sounding pitch to the highest sounding pitch, e.g., in an ascending scale, and on the eighth note the scale repeats. Thus, concordant musical notes in a scale form the octave. In the western musical tradition, the notes in an octave, such as in a major C scale, are C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, where a Middle C4 note may have a frequency of about 260 Hz, and an upper C5 note may have a frequency of about 520 Hz, and a lower C3 note may have a lower frequency of about 130 Hz. Because of the acoustic relationship between two pitches of notes an octave apart, the upper note is perceived as qualitatively identical to the lower note, but at a higher pitch. Hence, the octave is the interval of seven notes between one musical pitch and another with double, going higher in the scale, or half, going downward in the scale, its frequency.
In various instances, a triad of notes, e.g., of a major C, may be played together so as to produce a stronger melodic sound, such as a chord. The typical chord includes a major root note, e.g., C, played in addition to the third and fifth notes of the octave scale, e.g., E and G. In order to be concordant, notes and chords, such as produced by the plucking of strings of various lengths and weights, must be played in such a manner to create a harmonic tempo of pitches that move up or down the scale of notes in a precise mathematical relationship to one another.
As indicated above, the notes in an octave can be arranged into an ascending or descending order of pitches so as to make up a musical scale. The steps between the pitches may be measured in tones, e.g., whole steps, and semitones, e.g., half steps. Whole steps make up the major or whole notes, while half steps make up the sharps and flats of the major notes. Particularly, in typical musical notation, a sharp means higher in pitch by a semitone (half step or half note), and a flat means lower in pitch by a semitone. A semitone, therefore, is the distance between two notes that are next to one another in pitch, and it is the smallest musical interval used in the Western musical scale; while a whole tone is the distance of two semitones, e.g., the distance between two whole notes that are separated by one other note in pitch.
This can clearly be seen with respect to the organizational lay out of a keyboard of a piano. The distance between two white keys, or notes, that are side by side may be a whole tone, if there is no black key between them, or a semitone, if there is a black key in between. Accordingly, on a piano keyboard, to go from a C to a C sharp (or D flat) is a semitone, but to go from a C to a D is a tone. An octave, therefore, may be divided into twelve semitones that are exactly equal in size. Consequently, a typical music scale will consists of the eight whole notes of the octave, as well as an additional five notes consisting of various semitones, e.g., sharps and flats.
In order for anyone to be able to play the music arranged and/or composed by another, the notes that comprise the music to be played and their order, as well as the timing for their playing, may be written down in a form called musical notation. Such notation therefore will allow any person who knows how to read such music to play the music composed by the other exactly the way it is assumed its composer meant it to be played. Hence, musical notation involves the use of symbols that stand for the various elements of the music to be played, including but not limited to: the staff, the clef, the key signature, the measure, the time signature, the tempo, and/or the like.
For instance, a stave or staff is characteristically drawn out on a page of paper as a latticework consisting of a set of parallel lines where the notes to be played are illustrated by the lines and spaces that are written down in the staff. The staff ordinarily includes five parallel horizontal lines, and the four intervening spaces between them. Each line or space in the staff corresponds to a note having a particular pitch, and thus, represents a note in the scale of an octave that is to be played. Such notes are designated on the staff by a note indicator whereby the line or space wherein the note indicator is positioned indicates which note of the scale is to be played, and which type of note indicator used indicates for how long the note is to be played. Hence, notes on a staff set forth the pitch of the music, whereby where the note indicator is positioned on the staff designates the pitch, e.g., high or low notes, to be played. Each of such notes so indicated can be applied to the piano such that each line or space represents a white key in a set of keys comprising the octave on the keyboard of the piano.
Such note indicators may be employed not only to indicate which note is to be played, e.g., pitch, but may also be used as time reference symbols so as to designate the time period during which the particular note is to be played. A whole note indicator indicates that the note is to be played for a whole length of a given time, a half-length note indicator indicates that the note is to be played for half of the time as that of a whole note indicator, a quarter-length and eighth-length indicator indicates the note is to be played for a quarter or an eighth of the time. Hence, there are four typical note indicators: a whole note, a half note, and quarter note symbol. Therefore, the pitch of composition is indicated by where the natural note is put on the staff, and where these notes are to be played as a sharp or a flat, there are sharps or flat indicators that may be notated in front of the notes.
The staff may include additional symbols, such as a clef, a break, an accidental, a key signature, a time signature, codas, and the like, which symbols dictate the pitch, rhythm, tempo, and articulation of the notes to be played in performing the musical composition. Clefs define the pitch range of the particular staff on which it is placed. Particularly, a clef is employed as a sign, e.g., a key, that is positioned at the beginning of the staff, e.g., it is usually the leftmost symbol, and makes it possible for someone playing the written music to work such as to indicate a change in register for instruments with a wide range. Because there are only five lines in an ordinary staff, the clef functions as a designator to assign individual notes to the given lines and/or spaces of the staff.
More particularly, because a typical staff is only large enough to cover one and a half octaves of music, different clefs are used for notating high and low ranges for the composition. For example, there are Treble, Alto, Tenor, and Bass clefs. The treble clef is typically called a “G clef”, and is drawn by starting with a circle in the middle, then going up, round and straight down with a hook at the end. Counting from the bottom, the second line of the staff goes through the middle of the treble clef's circle. Positioned here, it assigns G above middle C to the second line from the bottom of the staff. Hence, a note on this line therefore will be a G note. Accordingly, the note in the space above the G line becomes representative of an A note, and the note on the line above the A becomes representative of a B note, etc. for all the notes in the scale. Additionally, Middle C then becomes the first ledger line below the staff.
The treble clef is traditionally used to demark the playing of notes higher than middle C, and for piano or flute music, the notes to be played by the right-hand are usually written using the treble clef. The alto clef is an example of a C clef, because the middle of the symbol that makes up the C clef, written on the third line of the staff, points to the middle C note. The tenor clef is another C clef, however, the middle C note is written on the fourth line of the staff. The bass clef is an F clef because the two dots that make up the clef are on either side of the fourth line up, which demarcates the F note below the middle C note. Typically, the bass clef is used to notate the notes to be played by the left hand in piano music. Hence, the notes to be played by a pianist's right hand may be written using the treble clef, while the music to be played by the pianist's left hand may be written using the bass clef.
In traditional tablature, a key signature is typically notated after the clef and shows the key for the piece to be played. For instance, when a music piece is played, it is typically played in a particular key, such as a key of one of the twelve tone and semitone notes. As described herein, on octave is comprised of eight natural notes, called tone notes, but may also include sharps or flats, which comprise semitones that are in a pitch between the whole notes. The key signature, therefore, shows which notes in a written composition have to regularly be changed into semitones, e.g., sharps or flats.
Hence, a key signature is a set of sharp or flat symbols placed together on the staff, next to the clef, that designates which of the demarcated notes need to be played higher or lower than their corresponding natural notes. Particularly, a sharp symbol on a line or space between the lines in the key signature raises the particular note that would otherwise be indicated by that line or space one semitone above the natural, and a flat lowers such indicated notes one semitone. For example, a sharp raises the pitch of notes on the corresponding line or space, as well as all the octaves thereof, by a semitone; and a flat lowers the pitch of notes on the corresponding line or space by a semitone and all octaves thereof, thus defining the prevailing major or minor key. On a piano such semitones are played via the black keys.
Such key signatures typically apply through to the end of the piece or up to the next key signature. Thus, a symbol in the key signature affects all of the particular set of notes designated in that octave and all remaining octaves, thereby defining the prevailing major or minor key in that piece of music. For example, a sharp on the top line of a treble staff, which would indicate that an F note is to be played, would convert that note to an F sharp, and this transition would then apply to any Fs not only on that line, but also to Fs in the bottom space of the staff, and to any other Fs in the music. Consequently, the key signature serves as the “home note” or tonic of the piece to be played, such that the piece will be built on the notes of the scale that begin with that note, and when the piece finishes it normally comes to rest on this home note.
There are two kinds of key: a major key, and a minor key. A major key is composed of seven separate notes, plus an eighth that is the same as the first but an octave higher. For instance, the simplest major scale to write, or play, e.g., on the piano, is the C major key, because it is the only major scale not to require sharps or flats, and hence can be played using only the white keys on the piano keyboard. A minor scale, on the other hand, is a scale that forms a triad and has the three following scale degrees: the tonic, the minor third above the tonic, and the perfect fifth above the tonic, which together form the minor triad. Commonly, a minor scale is a series of notes with a sad, somber character and begins on the sixth note of its relative major scale.
Further, because a scale can start on any note, and there are twelve notes within an octave, seven natural notes, or tones, and five semitone notes, there are twelve major and minor keys. For the piano these are the seven white notes and the five black notes on the keyboard. Accordingly, each major key has its own key signature, however, each minor key shares a key signature with one of the major keys. Particularly, there are fifteen possible key signatures: up to seven sharps, up to seven flats, or no sharps or flats. There are many reasons for writing a key signature, such as saving time by avoiding the writing out of sharps or flats, and further, it helps the player to think in the key of the piece.
Typically the staff may be divided into bars. Bar lines are vertical lines that transect the horizontal lines of the staff separating it into measures. Each measure, between two sets of bars, represents a small amount of time that governs the beat or pulse of the music being played. Particularly, a beat is the fundamental unit of music, and it is used to measure the pulse and/or rhythm of the music. As such, the bars divide the piece into regular groupings of beats, and as described below, the time signature shows these groupings. Hence, each measure typically has the same number of beats in it, where the beat represents a given note to be played.
Additionally, at the beginning of the music notation there will be a time signature. Time signatures define the meter of the music to be played. Typically, a time signature indicates how many beats there are in each measure between the bar lines. Hence, as described above, music is “marked off” in uniform sections called bars or measures, and time signatures establish the number of beats in each.
The time signature is a set of two numbers represented as a fraction, one on top, e.g., the numerator, and the other one on the bottom, e.g., the denominator, and they are usually positioned immediately after where the key signature is written. The two numbers of the time signature tell a music performer how many times a given note should be played for each beat within the measure of the music. The number in the top of the time signature, e.g., the numerator, tells a player how many of a given note there are in each measure, e.g., the number of times the note must be played within a given time. This is the beat. The number in the bottom of the time signature, e.g., the denominator, tells what the count is for the note being played, e.g., what the time is within which each beat must occur, and also signifies which note gets the beat.
The number on the bottom of the time signature can be any number that follows the pattern 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, etc. where each number in the pattern is two times the number that came before it. If a note is not to be played for a given beat in the measure, this may be notated by a rest, which represents a silence in the music of that measure. For example, 4/4 time means that there are four quarter notes, or notes that last one beat, in each measure. Hence, music that pulses in a repeating pattern such as 1-2-3-4-1-2-3-4 will be divided into bars with four beats-worth of music in each bar.
Along with the beats to be played, as indicated by the time signature, the tempo, e.g., the speed at which the music is to be played may also be indicated, such as noted by a word or words positioned above the staff. Additionally, at various places in the tablature dynamic marks may be notated so as to show how loud or soft the given notes are to be played. Notes which are very high or low can be put in additional lines called ledger lines, which lines may be added above or below the stave.
There are several problems with the above-described methods for notating the music to be played by a given composition. For instance, the tablature, of the prior art, is laborious to notate, difficult to read, and extremely tortuous to follow. Particularly, there is simply no relationship whatsoever between a given symbol for a note to be played, e.g., a particular pitch to be sounded, as indicated in the tablature, and what mechanical action needs to be performed so as to play that note on the instrument being played.
Further, the staff system itself is not intuitive and very tough to translate for one simply reading the music, let alone for one attempting to interpret and then play the music at real time, such as at a performance. For example, the five lines of the staff can become very dense and convoluted the more difficult the music to be played becomes. The more and mixed the notes to be played, the more varied increases or decreases in pitch, the rapidity with which the tempo is to be changed, as well as fluctuations in keys, can make the tablature practically undecipherable.
Furthermore, the clef is an archaic manner with which to represent the key notes in a scale of music to be played as the symbol itself has virtually no innate relationship to the key or pitch it indicates, and this becomes even more complicated when different clefs are used to indicate which hand plays which notes on the instrument being played in performing the music.
The key signature suffers from the same problem in that there is no indicative nature, outside of learning music theory, between how the signature is notated within the staff, and how it relates to the type of notes to be played that are part of any particular key. Additionally, when reading music it is often difficult to interpret the symbols of the particular notes demarcated, let alone having to decipher whether they are following a major or a minor progression.
For instance, because a scale can start on any note, and there are potentially seven major and five minor keys that can be played with respect to a given octave, and because each major key has its own key signature, while each minor key shares a key signature with one of the major keys, a person playing by following the tablature has not only to figure out how to manipulate his or her hands and/or body so as to be able to play the instrument, they must also be able to do so while attempting to decipher complex symbols set forth in a convoluted staff format. This makes learning to play an instrument incredibly difficult, and virtually impossible to do so while reading music. Such is attested to by considering the attrition rate of those who start learning to play an instrument, and those who actually succeed by learning to read and play the music via the tablature successfully. It has been estimated that about 95% of the people who begin to learn to play an instrument fail to do so because of the complexity involved with learning to read the tablature.
Learning to decipher, interpret, and implement the playing of music, such as by reading the tablature, is made even more difficult when having to account for the various different measures and time signatures that are dictated by the tablature. Such difficulty is not simply a technical problem inherent to learning to read music, it is also an antiquated system that stifles creativity while promoting mimicry. A student learning to play a given piece of music is required to follow the prescribed manner in which the song has been notated and set forth by the measures and given time signatures.
In such an instance, the student, if they can learn to read and interpret the music in the first place, is then locked and bound within a system that dictates the every move of the person playing the piece. Such rigid constructionism prevents the student from exploration and discovery and rather forces them into a strict mode of playing that is mere parroting without any clear hope of innovation. Even the tempo, pitch, and rhythm are dictated in a didactic manner to the student learning to play by the tablature such that it takes a herculean effort to learn to play and read music, and yet, almost everyone loves to listen to music. In fact, it is estimated that over hundreds of millions of people worldwide listen to music on personal, digital music players, and in the US the average person listens to about four hours of music everyday.
Further, as noted above, music is played on an instrument. Common instruments include those operated by pressing keys, such as a piano, those operated by plucking strings, such as a guitar, those operated by moving wind through a chamber, such as a flute, and combinations of the same. For instance, a piano is a musical instrument that includes a large soundboard of metal strings that are held taught under a given tension such that when struck a given string vibrates and thereby plays a characteristic musical note. To effectuate the striking of such strings, the piano includes a plurality of wooden hammers, e.g., one for each string, and an equal number of levers or keys that control the operation of the wooden hammers, which in turn control the striking of the strings. Particularly, the strings of the piano's soundboard are arranged into octaves that may be played by depressing the various keys of the piano, which then causes the corresponding wooden hammer to strike their respective strings, thereby causing them to vibrate at their resonant frequency producing their characteristic sounds, as noted above.
A typically piano keyboard consists of eighty-eight keys of which fifty-five are longer, white keys; and thirty-six are shorter black keys, which together form seven octaves (plus four minor notes) of twelve notes each. The white keys control the playing of the seven natural major notes of the western scale, organized from lowest to highest in pitch, including C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, for the C major scale. The black keys control the playing of the five sharp and/or minor notes that are associated with the major scale. These twelve keys are then repeated seven times at the interval of the octave. The notes of the piano are played by depressing the keys, and silenced when the keys are released. However, the notes can be sustained, even once a given key is released, such as by depressing a sound sustaining pedal.
Like a piano, a guitar is a stringed musical instrument including a fretted fingerboard, much like the soundboard of a piano, having a resonating chamber, typically incurved sides, and anywhere from four or six to twelve or eighteen strings that are played by plucking or strumming them with the fingers or a plectrum. Frets are metal strips that are embedded along the fretboard and located at exact points that divide the string into a scale length in accordance with a specific mathematical formula. Pressing a string against a fret or fret board determines the strings' vibrating length and therefore its resultant pitch. The pitch of each consecutive fret is defined at a half-step interval on a 12 pitch scale, e.g., a chromatic scale. Standard classical guitars have 19 frets and electric guitars between 21 and 24 frets. Each set of twelve frets represents an octave, and the frets are laid out to accomplish an equal tempered division of the octave. More particularly, the twelfth fret divides the scale length exactly into two halves. Typically, a guitar has six strings that are tuned so that each string plays a different note, including E, A, D, G, B, and E.
Likewise, a flute is a reedless wind instrument made from a hollow tube that forms a cylindrical resonant cavity. A typical flute has a mouthpiece opening, e.g., an embouchure hole, which a player blows into, and further includes holes along its length that are stopped by the fingers or keys. The flute may be designed to be held vertically or horizontally in such a manner that the player's breath strikes a narrow edge of the mouthpiece opening. Accordingly, a flute produces sound from the flow of air across the various openings of the holes along its length. For instance, as a player blows in through the mouthpiece opening a stream of air is directed across one or more holes in the instrument such that a vibration of air at the hole is created, this vibration excites the air contained in the resonant chamber producing a note as the air is expelled through the opening(s). Particularly, the energy in the stream of air pushed through the flute is radiated as sound out of the end and any open holes. However, the air stream must be directed at the correct angle and velocity, or else the air in the flute will not vibrate.
The pitch of the note is produced by the opening and closing of the holes in the body of the tubular resonant chamber, which opening and closing changes the effective length of the resonator and its corresponding resonant frequency. Further, by varying the air pressure transmitted to through the mouthpiece opening by the player, the pitch of a note can also be changed by causing the air in the flute to resonate at a harmonic rather than the fundamental frequency such as without opening or closing any holes. Hence, the distance between the mouthpiece hole and the first finger-hole is selected such that as air is passed through the finger-hole, a given note of the scale, e.g., an A or a G, is sounded. Typically, for a tube of a given length, open at both ends, the wavelength of the sound is twice the length of the tube, and hence, the finger-holes along its length will be determined mathematically such that each hole produces a note in the Western major scale depending on the fingering pattern of which holes are open, which are closed, and which are semi-open at a given time.
For example, many modern flutes feature keys and levers that open and close the finger-holes of the flute and thereby work together to create different musical notes. Typically, both hands are used to finger the keys and create the different notes. Particularly, the left hand index finger key produces a C note, the middle finger key produces an A note, the ring finger key produces a G note, and the pinky key produces a G sharp key. The right hand index finger key produces an F note, the middle finger key produces an E note, and the ring finger key produces a D note. The right hand may also have trill keys: B flat, C sharp, D and D sharp. The pinky keys in the right hand can be the E flat, low C sharp, low C, low B and high C facilitator key.
Accordingly, instruments are useful for the playing of music. In particular, various parts of the instrument including keys and/or strings thereof need to be manipulated in various manners so as to play or otherwise produce music. However, knowing when and how to manipulate such keys and/or strings in the playing of notated music is very difficult. Particularly, it is hard to know which key or string to manipulate to produce a given note, how long to press it, and with what amount of force. Additionally, such playing is made even more complicated when one must read and translate the instructions by having to interpret the archaic tablature in which it is encoded. For these and other reasons over ninety-five (95%) of the people who start to learn to play an instrument give it up not having reached their desired goals for wanting to learn to play in the first place.
What is needed, therefore, is a new way to memorialize a given piece of music that has been, or is to be, composed that does away with the archaic staff system and complex musical notation currently deployed by tablature today. A new system that makes writing a composition less laborious, easier to decipher, and is more intuitive in that the symbols employed are more closely related to the instrument to be played, would be very useful in helping the ninety-five percent of the people who try but fail to learn to read tablature actually be capable of not only learning to read the music but play it as well. Additionally what are further needed are devices that make playing an instrument easier and/or better ties the musical notation to the correct manipulations of the instrument required to play the notes notated in the music. Accordingly, the musical notation, devices, instruments, and systems described herein, as well as their methods of use meet these and other such needs.